The Nigerian Communications Commission has issued a statement to deny that there was any directive to GSM operators to shut down BlackBerry services in the country in the wake of public protests against the recent fuel subsidy removal.

The full statement:

THE NCC’S POSITION ON BLACKBERRY SERVICES
The attention of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has been drawn to an information making rounds that the NCC had at a meeting this morning agreed with CEOs of telecommunications networks to shutdown Blackberry Services in order to deny Nigerians the use of that very important social network.

The Management hereby states categorically that there was never such a meeting held, nor was there ever a resolution to shut down Blackberry services. The Public is please advised to disregard such information.

The Commission enjoins the network operators to continue to provide all telecommunication services, including Blackberry Services without fail.

Signed
Tony Ojobo
Director, Public Affairs

From the break of today the first day of November 2011, the clock began to tick as the countdown begins to the 30 days ultimatum issued by NCC (Nigerian Communications Commission) to Globacom, MTN and Airtel.

The Nigerian Communications Commission has said that it would penalize the three major network operators to the tune of one million naira if they failed to improve service qualities at the end of this month.

The commission carried out independent monitoring exercises of the three networks across the country and found them lacking in performance.

According to a statement by Mr Reuben Muoka, Head, Media and public relations NCC, the commission will stop these operators from further sales of SIM cards by the end of November 2011 if they failed to meet the key performance indicators set by the commission.

These key performance indicators are:

- Call set up success rate

- Call completion rate

- Stand alone dedicated control channel

- Hand over success rate.

Editor’s note: One wonders why data services are never included in NCC’s performance metrics.

Mobile number portability (MNP) is a subject that Nigerians have been passionate about. Having been at the mercy of poor QoS (Quality of service) from operators, many have turned to demanding for MNP as a way out. With MNP, a subscriber can cross over to another network but retain his/her number.

The Nigerian Communication Commission (NCC) has now taken concrete steps towards the proposed number portability by appointing a consortium of three companies to implement the proposed number portability services.

Below is an except of the news item from the NCC website:

Nigerian Communications Commission, NCC, weekend, said it had appointed a consortium of three companies to implement the proposed number portability services which will allow Nigerian phone users move from one network to another without losing their numbers.

The consortium of Interconnect/Saab Grintek/Telecordia was announced by the commission as the preferred vendor for the service after the technical, financial and demo presentations by the bidding vendors.

Number portability will allow subscribers move to alternate networks when they are no longer enjoying the quality of services being obtained from their current operators or when they are no longer happy with the tariffs offered by their current subscribers. They will still retain their original numbers irrespective of the new network from which they may be obtaining their services.

Source

I am hoping that the implementation comes fast. With the different juicy offers from different networks, there is the pressure to switch. However, switching now would mean a change of my mobile number. With MNP in place, you wouldn’t have to worry about losing your number when you switch.

What do you think of this project? Will MNP solve our QoS problems? Which network will you be switching to and why? Let’s have your comments.

From a paid advert in today’s edition of The Punch is the news that mobile subscribers can now reach the Nigerian Communications Commission’s consumer affairs bureau via a toll-free number 0800-CALL-NCC (0800-2255-622).

The number again: 08002255622.

Naturally, one can imagine subscribers swamping this number with calls, but it seems that the NCC thought of that. Subscribers are to access the NCC Contact Centre only on the following conditions:

• you must have lodged a complaint with your service provider
• you must obtain a complaint ticket number
• if you are dissatisfied with the resolution of your service provider, you then call the NCC Contact Centre (apparently, if you call the NCC Contact Centre line, the above details will be required of you)

The Contact Centre is open 8am to 8pm Mondays to Saturdays (except on national public holidays).

In a move to address security issuesabout mobile telephony in the country,the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has announced that the sale of SIM cards on the streets will no longer be permitted from March 1, 2010.

The NCC also says that the operators have been directed to ensure that all currently active SIMs on their respective networks be registered. New SIMs will require registration before activation. Documents like I.D. cards and passport photographs will be required for subscriber registration.

Before the advent of GSM technology in Nigeria, all existing telecoms companies required subscriber registration. Since then, things have changed quite a bit, such that even lines on CDMA networks can now be purchased off the street by anyone without any identification whatsoever.

A serious result of this is that criminal elements find it easy to use mobile communications without a trace. Subscriber registration will certainly go a long way in curbing this.

Of course, subscriber registration and the barring of sale of SIMs on the streets also means that the networks will experience a slower rate of subscriber increase, but we are guessing here that this slower expansion will translate to better quality of service for existing subscribers.

The last few years have witnessed the mobile landscape being littered with promo after promo and huge traffic spikes during such promos. Hopefully, the mobile lottery jamboree will abate (if only a little) as well with this new policy from the NCC.

In all, Mobility Nigeria welcomes the new move to register mobile subscribers.

Recently, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) announced new (and lower) interconnect rates to take effect from December 31, 2009.

Interconnection rate represents the rate which a telecommunications operator pays to another operator on whose network a call is terminated.

The Guardian newspaper reports on this development:

With this development, call terminations on new entrants’ networks are graduated from N10.12 from December 31, 2009 to N8.20 in 2012 while call terminations on older operator’s networks is fixed at N8.20 over the same period.

Another major feature of the new rates is the determination of Interconnect Rates for Short Messaging Services (SMS), for the first time in the country.

It is clear that the NCC is weilding the new rates as a means to regulate tariff in the industry. Lower interconnect rates mean that network operators can further drop their tariffs, as tariffs are often directly related to interconnect rates.

In the backdrop of this, consumers across the country are hopeful for lower telecoms tariffs soon. How soon this will be is a different matter. However, with Glo promising to crash mobile data rates soon, courtesy of its new submarine cable and the new interconnect rates, 2010 is looking on the bright side for telecoms subscribers in Nigeria.

In 2007, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) issued 3G licences to four operators – MTN, Glo, Zain, and little-known Alheri. Since the issuance of the licenses, the other three operators have deployed and now offer 3G-based services to millions of subscribers across the country.

But not Alheri. Till date, the Dangote-owned company has nothing to show by way of deploying 3G services. However, Technology Times reports that Etisalat, the fourth GSM operator, is in talks with Alheri to buy the dormant 3G license.

If this pulls through, Etisalat will join the league of GSM networks offering 3G services, and the playing field become a little more level. Etisalat Nigeria currently deploys EDGE as a platform for delivering near-3G speeds. However, a 3G license will allow the youngest GSM operator to deploy HSDPA (3.5G) and HSUPA, delivering true broadband speeds to its fast-growing subscriber base.

Source

We have just updated our page presenting statistics about mobile networks in Nigeria. The information on that page is sourced from the NCC website.

What is significant is that Etisalat has moved several steps up into the exclusive list of top 5 mobile operators in Nigeria. The 0809 network now occupies number 5 slot with 1,835,870 active subscribers, trailing Visafone (2,533,812 active subscribers). Multilinks Telkom follows Etisalat closely with 1,820,750 active subscribers.

When NITEL was recently put up for sale for the umpteenth time, I expressed the absurdity of Globacom’s interest in purchasing NITEL. Both NITEL and Globacom are national operators – and they are the only two. It simply would be counter-productive to allow such a purchase take place. We would simply return to a state of monopoly.

Thankfully, the NCC (Nigerian Communications Commission) and BPE (Bureau of Public Enterprises) have taken steps to ensure that such a purchase does not happen. Excerpts from the news item:

For instance, Globacom was told that by virtue of its Second National Operator (SNO) licence, it cannot buy NITEL as a whole unit, as this “would leave Globacom with two SNO licences and would hence, be anti-competition”. Chigbo Anichebe, the spokesperson for the BPE, explains, “Because of Globacom’s SNO licence, they will not be allowed to also bid for the domestic fixed telephony lines, as they already have the licence to operate their own.” The company cannot also bid for SAT-3, as applies to Etisalat and MTN.

“The Nigeria telecom operators, that is, MTN, Etisalat, Zain and Glo shall not be allowed to purchase the mobile arm, M-TEL, since they presently hold Digital Mobile Licence and General System for Mobile (DML/GSM) licences. To the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), the purchase of M-TEL by any of the present GSM licence holders would present competition challenges and will conflict with regulatory guidelines and licensing conditions.”

Interestingly, the CEO of one of the operators was quoted as saying, “We are surprised that the BPE and NCC could do such.”

I am at a loss as to what exactly is surprising about these decisions. Why would an operator want to hold two GSM licences? To what purpose? Why would a sane regulator allow an existing national operator to take over the only other national operator?

Dr. Emmanuel Ekuwem, the president of the Association of Telecommunications Companies of Nigeria, summed it up well when he said, “Globacom is already a second national carrier and the firm has the licence to operate the same services as NITEL. The telecoms sector must have sanity, when a company gets really too big and too powerful with a large coverage, that can affect competition in the industry.”

Good move by the NCC and BPE.

Source: 234next.com